An advanced Linux Mag - was Re: [Gllug] Algorithm question foryour Friday morning

[Ryan Cartwright]

Mike Brodbelt wrote:
> Jason Clifford wrote:
>> On Sat, 18 Nov 2006, salsaman wrote:
>>
>> If you can be certain that you can get a sufficient readership then you 
>> can always get the advertising. The difficult bit is the former.
>>
> 
> Why don't you try ditching the idea of printing it - make issues
> available as PDF once a month, free download for registered users. Your
> registered user list and number of downloads gives you some idea about
> circulation - you can then take that to advertisers. With zero
> print/distribution costs it should be a lot easier to make ad revenue
> cover costs of commissioning articles, editing, hosting and bandwidth.
> 
> There's another web magazine I read regularly that uses this model, and
> it seems to work well for them.
> 
This does seem to work but Free Software Magazine[1] ( assuming that's 
the one you are referring to ) is not exactly a great money spinner - 
according to the editor anyway.

They make the printed version available via print on demand (Lulu.com) 
which further saves costs. They also "pay" contributors in books donated 
by FOSS publishers (O'Reilly, No Starch, Apress etc.).

I think there is space for such a mag as Jason describes but the 
(traditional printed) computer magazine market is very crowded so it 
might be better to approach it in a way that Mike suggests.

Ryan

[1] http://www.freesoftwaremagazine.com
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